2500 Books for Schools Devastated by Typhoon Haiyan

We have shipped 2500 books to Tacloban, Philippines. The books will be distributed among schools that were affected by the typhoon and the public library in Tacloban City. Many school structures were badly damaged by the typhoon and the schools lost all their libraries. The books were donated by several donors and included fiction, non-fiction as well as school books.

While I was in Philippines, I walked through some of the devastated schools. It was evident that they had lost everything including their libraries. After touring the Asian Development College, the Director, Mrs. Chua told me, “Rev. if you can send us books for our library that would be a very big help. We lost all our books. Our students need books, any book you can send will be helpful.”

Upon my return to the US, I asked several people to organize a book shipment. Mrs. Maite Dickenson and Mr. Jamie Dickenson happily volunteered. They managed this project in the US. The main tasks included packing and organizing the shipment and working with the shipping company until we got it on the ship. I really appreciate their patience and hard work.

I am also grateful to everyone who donated books, especially our good brother, Dr. Gnana Segaram, a Sri Lanka native living in the US, who provided us with about 2000 valuable new and used books. We are grateful to Mr. Alex Nason who made special effort to collect some books through his network of friends. I also value the help of Susan and Mike, and most of all my assistant Adam who provided all the necessary assistance to get things done.

The books were sent by ship and will take two months to arrive. We expect them to be in Philippines by the end of June.